Canada must have been completely surprised and humiliated by the 5-3 beating they took in the preliminaries, because after a tentative start, they came on like gangbusters; taking control and shooting well.

After Canada hammered at US goalie Ryan Miller for a while, Johnathan Toews scored the 1^st goal for Canada. During this tournament, the first team to score has been the one to win, so it didn’t look good for the US. In the second period, Corey Perry broke free and caught the US defense looking, scoring another for Canada.

 The US finally got one in with 7 minutes left in the 2^nd. Ryan Kesler got the deflection past Canada’s goalie, Roberto Luongo.

 I was watching the game with a friend (he’s not a huge hockey fan) and at 3 minutes to go in the third period he commented it was pretty much over.  I replied that three minutes was a lot for hockey; anything can happen.  I made a good call on that one. The US bore down on Canada, ruthlessly pressing to gain an advantage. Then, with only 24 seconds to go Zach Parise got an opportunity and shot around Luongo to tie it up and put the game into sudden-death overtime.

 With the four-on-four instead of the full team it seemed like the play was slower again, each team carefully searching for an opening, curbing the previous aggression.  The fevered press by the USA that got the last goal was replaced with a focus on defense.  Canada attempted more shots, and closer in. The US attempts were further away and less frequent.

The incredible game ended when Canadian star Sidney Crosby slipped the puck through Miller’s legs scoring for the win. The Canadian crowd went wild, the celebration beginning.  Ryan Miller fell forward on the ice, hopes for gold crushed.

 Though I would have preferred to see Team USA bring home the gold, it was a great game; exciting to watch, interesting to talk about.  I’m glad I was able to catch this one.

 I have to wonder, what happened to Finland?  This wasn’t supposed to be the rout it ended up.

 The USA is now assured at least silver as they head to the final against the winner of this evening’s match-up between Canada and Slovakia.

 All I got to see was celebrating and the commentators going on about how great the game was for the US.  A 5-3 victory that is being called the ”biggest Olympic hockey upset since the Miracle on Ice” is a shame to miss. I sure wish I could have seen the great job done by goalie Ryan Miller (Canada outshot the US 45-23. that’s 42 saves.) Would have been nice to see Brian Rafalski score twice.  

Thanks for twisting the knife, NBC.

AAAAARRRRGGGHHH!

I looked forward to this game all week!  If I wasn’t a nice person, you would see a stream of obscentities here to rival a drunk sailor. Now I have to hop online every few minutes and read about the great game going on.

NBC and Comcast just ruined the Olympics for me.

In alpine skiing, you can watch Men’s Super Combined, which combines one downhill run with one slalom run. American Ted Ligety is the defending Olympic champion, but look for Americans Bode Miller and Andrew Weibrecht to give him a run for his money.

Biathlon will award medals for a men’s and women’s mass start event today.

Two man bobsled wraps up today. Team U.S. 1 was in a good position going into today’s runs.

Men’s ski cross runs qualifying and final rounds today. If you like snowboard cross, you’re going to love this new event. Former Alpine skiers Casey Puckett and Daron Rahlves lead the Americans. You may recognize both these names as Rahlves represented the United States at the Olympics three times in alpine racing, and Puckett was a four time Olympian in the alpine disciplines.

The women’s speedskating 1500m will be raced today, as well.

In addition to medal rounds, you can check out curling and hockey (yes, I know some of you have had enough of curling and hockey). Or if you want something a bit lighter, ice dancers will be performing their free dance today.

The Czech Republic was dominating the game and had a 4-0 lead when one of the players made a mistake, or maybe took a shot.  Whatever the intention, Latvia was able to take advantage and recover the puck to get a very clear shot on goal.  The shot went in and spurred Latvia on to score again.  In that instant, a rout was turned into a game. During a pause in play, commentator Jeremy Roenick opined that the Czech Republic had gotten cocky and sloppy and that a bad pass got Latvia their break.  Mike Milken disagreed, saying he thought it was just a shot that got away from the player. Roenick repeated his opinion,calling it a mental mistake and Milken nixed right back.  At that point, Roenick said something along the lines of, “Well, it’s been so long since you played, maybe you don’t remember how it works.” Folks, there was some definite disdain in his voice and a little snarl in his look.  I thought he was going to smack Milken.  No surprise we went straight to commercial after that one! When they came back, play had resumed and everyone was ignoring the little tiff. 

I guess that testosterone level remains high even if you’ve retired!

The last 17 seconds of the game had Czech Republic scoring an empty net goal when Latvia gave one last desperate push during a power play.  The final score was 5-2.

More exciting was the 3-2 win by Canada over Switzerland in a shootout.  Canada took the lead early in the second period, but the Swiss stepped up play and scored late in the second.  You could really see the physical side of hockey get put into overdrive by the Swiss.  They used body checks to their advantage; you saw a few words exchanged after some serious slams.  Penalties increased, but play was still sharp. No score from the third resulted in overtime, then a shootout.

Three players on each team failed to score before Canada’s Sidney Crosby scored for the win. Great good fun for a match that was supposed to be heavily in favor of Canada.

Women’s Super Combined— potentially more medals for Julia Mancuso and Lindsey Vonn.

Biathlon— Could there be a medal for American Tim Burke? Will Norway be happier with their results today?

Men’s Figure Skating—Who’s getting the gold? Evan Lysacek, Evgeni Plushenko, or someone else entirely?

Snowboarding— More halfpipe today. It’s the women’s turn. Will the American women exceed the American men’s medal count from last night?

Hockey— The men and the women compete today. The men take on Norway. The women take on Finland.

Speed skating— The women take on the 1000m. Don’t expect the same medal count for the American women as the American men.

Skeleton— Competition starts today for the men and women. Americans stand a much better chance at medaling here than in the luge.

Curling— both the men and women take on Denmark today. You can catch this live if you have CNBC. No, really, live coverage of an event.

That’s it. Check back throughout the afternoon and evening for coverage of events.

Today was supposed to be Super Combined in men’s downhill, but due to poor weather conditions (blowing now and low visibility), that event has been pushed to Friday. At this rate, Alpine skiing will finish up sometime in March or April.

Presumably, the snow won’t stop biathlon (it’s still on the schedule, as of this writing). For today’s women’s 10 km pursuit and men’s 12.5 km pursuit, the athletes qualify by placing in the top 60 in a sprint competition. No American women are expected to qualify. For the men, Tim Burke and Lowell Bailey stand a decent chance of qualifying, even though this is not the best event for either of them.

CURLING Curling, a favorite in the Manty household, starts today. The American men are scheduled for two matches vs. Germany and Norway, and the American women are scheduled for one match vs. Japan. The American men won bronze in Torino. Will they be able to match or better that in Vancouver?

Men’s figure skating starts tonight with the short program. All three of the American men are strong contenders for a medal. Evan Lysacek is the reigning world champion and finished fourth in Torino after battling the flu. Jeremy Abbott is a relative newcomer but has won two U.S. titles. And then there’s Johnny Weir. Hopefully, the only drama surrounding his performances will be the performances, themselves. American men haven’t won gold since Brian Boitano in 1988. They’re hoping to change that this year.

Both the men’s and women’s hockey teams will be competing today. The men will be taking on Switzerland. The women will be playing Russia.

Women’s luge will be awarding a medal today. Americans Erin Hamlin and Julia Clukey are currently in 15th and 16th place after two runs—long shots for a medal but not out of contention. American Megan Sweeney is currently in 27th.

More snowboard cross today, as Lindsey Jacobellis tries to win the gold that eluded her in Turin, when she fell practically at the finish line. She is joined on the team by Olympic newcomers Callan Chythlook-Sifsof and Faye Gulini.

Finally, women’s speed skating races the 500m— hopefully with fewer problems with the ice than the men experienced yesterday. Elli Ochowicz, Jennifer Rodriguez, Heather Richardson and Lauren Cholewinski represent the United States. None are favorites to medal.

Other differences are the ability for the goalie to play behind goal line (though NHL goalies can play directly behind the net, “no touch” icing, overtime instead of shootouts and penalties shot by anyone on the team (not just the victim.) For many US fans, the noticeable difference is the treatment of fighting.  NHL gives only a 5 minute penalty for fighting, where the Olympic rules call for a match penalty and possible ejection from the game. You’ll still see a lot of body checks, high sticking, hooking and holding, but don’t expect the gloves to come off as quickly as they do in the US.

Personally, I love Olympic and International rules hockey.  It tends to be a little slower (if that’s really possible when they’re speeding around on skates) but there’s more emphasis on skill and less on thuggery.  Hockey gets quite beautiful when they concentrate more on the skills and less on the theatrics of fighting.